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The Death Merchant (TTT episode)
Summary After being transported away from an undetermined area/time on a prehistoric Earth in the previous episode, Tony Newman and Doug Phillips are sent forward in time, landing during the Battle of Gettysburg of 1863. A blast from a cannon goes off right by Newman, which, once Phillips asks for a nearby medic, Newman is pronounced dead at the scene. At Project Tic-Toc, it is confirmed that Phillips is the only signal being detected out of the two scientists. Convinced by a major to leave Newman behind for the time being and to assist him in tracking the enemy, he also has Phillips change into a Union uniform (even though as Phillips said, he was not a soldier). Meanwhile, personnel at Project Tic-Toc try a rare power surge to bring Newman back to life. It succeeds, but unfortunately he has no memory of who he is. Since he was revived next to an overturned courier’s wagon, he is assumed to be a Confederate officer, and dons such uniform to go about his newfound duties as a soldier, tracking down the enemy. Meanwhile Phillips and the Union major track down a mysterious person (who was briefly seen at the beginning with a large dog, being totally out of place, not wearing a uniform from either side, but a black cape) to his cabin, who has stolen a large amount of gunpowder, which must be recovered. He allows Phillips and the major inside, but turns the tables on them, severely wounding the major and disarming Phillips. Phillips is able to talk the man into letting him take the major into a storage room to try to care for him but the major passes away. Phillips then finds a trunk that is marked as Machiavelli, a philosopher and writer from several centuries before. Phillips (and the Project Tic-Toc personnel) surmise that the Time Tunnel was the cause for sending Machiavelli into the future. Newman then appears, which Phillips, after being unable to convince Newman that they are allies, is able to flee the cabin, but Machiavelli sends his dog after him. Project Tic-Toc then sends the dog back to his own time, but it causes an explosion and it is estimated that it will take hours for them to restore operations. Newman tracks down Phillips, who tries to talk some sense into Newman, but he takes Phillips back to Machiavelli, who is going to lead Newman and Phillips to the hidden gunpowder. Newman and Phillips get into another fight at the scene when Phillips threatens to blow up the gunpowder, then Newman finally gets his memory back. Machiavelli then lights the gunpowder himself when Phillips threatens that he will not get to enjoy the final battle (since, for the entire time, Machiavelli has just been enjoying himself and causing Newman and Phillips to square off against each other) as Project Tic-Toc tries to time-shift the scientists away. Background information/trivia *In the previous episode, the characters of Raul Nimon, Vokar and Zee were time-shifted back over a million years with Newman and Phillips. ("Chase Through Time") At the end of the episode, Newman and Phillips were sent to Gettysburg and Vokar and Zee were sent somewhere as well; it was not clarified if the latter two were sent back to their own time, nor did they seem to be shifted forward with Newman and Phillips for this episode. (It appeared that Nimon was left in the time period to be killed by many approaching giant bees.) *In an earlier episode, Phillips was administered a drug, given a new identity, and was instructed to kill Newman. ("Invasion") In this episode, Newman believes he is supposed to kill Phillips. *Machiavelli appearing due to the Time Tunnel does not really make any sense, as there was not an episode where Newman and Phillips traveled back in time and met him. Time-shifting also requires very precise calculations, which several times over past episodes people other than Newman and Phillips were shifted to Project Tic-Toc by accident, but not only did that happen when the Time Tunnel had a visual fix on them, but also there was never a time when the Time Tunnel somehow grabbed someone in some other time frame in history (again, which neither scientist had traveled to) and sent them forward several centuries by some freak accident. *For the first time during the series, the secret location of Project Tic-Toc is finally narrowed down: near the end, Lt. General Heywood Kirk orders for power to be tapped from Hoover Dam. So instead of Project Tic-Toc being anywhere in the U. S. with a desert location, it could be situated near the Nevada/Arizona border (since Hoover Dam is on the border of both states). Cast *James Darren as Dr. Tony Newman *Robert Colbert as Dr. Doug Phillips *Lee Meriwether as Dr. Ann MacGregor *John Zaremba as Dr. Raymond Swain *Whit Bissell as Lt. General Heywood Kirk *John Crawford as Major *Kevin Hagen as Sergeant Maddox *Kevin O'Neal as Corporal *Malachi Throne as Machiavelli Links The episode can be viewed at Hulu.com at The Time Tunnel channel Category:The Time Tunnel episodes